Vice President Mike Pence hugs Evelyn Holcombe at Floresville High School during a stop Nov. 8, 2017, in Floresville, Texas. A man opened fire inside a church in Sutherland Springs on Sunday, killing and wounding many; Holcombe was in the church during the shooting but escaped. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

Pence tells grieving town ‘faith is stronger than evil’

FLORESVILLE, Texas — Vice President Mike Pence traveled to this rural stretch of Texas to offer prayers and words of comfort to a stricken community three days after a lone gunman killed more than two dozen people during a Sunday morning church service.

The memorial service was held Wednesday (Nov. 8) on a high school football field in the neighboring town of Floresville, about 13 miles from the site of the massacre at First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs. The service followed Christian tradition and was replete with Bible readings and prayers to Jesus.

It offered few political points and no mention of guns, mental illness or domestic violence.

Pence said he was inspired by the strong convictions of the people of Sutherland Springs and especially the victims of its historic church, and he expressed his solidarity with their faith.

Off to the side of the stadium, a section was reserved for victims’ families, and it was to them that much of the prayers and words were addressed.

“Faith is stronger than evil,” Pence reassured the families. “Faith is the antidote to fear and despair.”

Thousands of people responded with shouts of “Yeah!” and “Amen!”

Earlier in the day, Pence visited the hospital where many survivors are being treated and met with the families of the victims. He also spoke briefly to reporters outside First Baptist Church, cordoned off with yellow tape.

“This evil must come to an end in our land,” he said, citing “bureaucratic failures” that allowed the shooter, Devin Patrick Kelley, to buy multiple weapons, including the Ruger AR-556 rifle he used at the church, despite having been admitted to a psychiatric hospital while he was in the Air Force.

Federal law prohibits gun possession by anyone who “has been committed to any mental institution.”

Kelley was also charged with assaulting his wife and stepson.

Pence said the Air Force and the Department of Defense were conducting reviews.

“We will find out why this information was not reported in 2012, and we will work to make sure it never happens again,” he said.

At the evening rally, Pence was introduced by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who offered his own testament of turning to God after an accident severed a vertebra in his spine and left him in a wheelchair.

“I questioned God, but you know who didn’t give up on me? God,” Abbott said. “God brought me all the way forward.”

Floresville’s Bernard Cenney, a retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army who came to the service to pay his respects, said the faith emphasis was a natural part of small-town Texas culture.

“Belief in God is really, really big here and it transcends going to church,” Cenney said. “There’s this wholesome belief in God and in something greater than us.”

Closing his speech, Pence invited his wife, Karen, to offer a prayer.

“We’re a family that believes in prayer,” she said. “Lord, thank you for being here with us right now.”